2007/10/31

Since I know a lot of my readers enjoy gaming..

Here is a site that I recently have been addicted to: Flash Games Mania
These little free games are so much fun, the minutes of the day, just seem to fly by playing those darn games ;)

2007/10/05

A little off-topic announcement

Just wanted to share a link to a partner site of mine. It is for all you gamers out there, and I know there are many of you on this blog. So feel free to visit:
Funny and Amazing Halo 3 Videos

2007/10/02

More you should know about video rental online and retail stores.

What you should always do before jumping into and start using a new service or product, is read the terms that you must accept, in order to buy the service.
This is important because the different video rental and retail companies out there have different plans, on how they are offering you their services. Now a days the normal way of online video rental, consist of you first selecting and joining a company. Then you tell them what type of movies you like, or you might tell them specifically what movies you would like to rent. Then the videos will be mailed to your home, where you will watch the movies, and send them back afterwards.

This is all well and good, but then comes the payment. Usually you have to pay a monthly fee, that will also include the shipment costs. It varies how many videos you can rent at a time. There are companies that offer you unlimited video rentals within each month, but then you usually have to pay more to get these types of memberships. It must be clarified that this type, usually have a limited number of videos on which you can have at once though. I suggest reading closely on this part in the terms of your selected company. I generally suggest choosing a service that has this unlimited program policy, it is such a shame to be denied to rent a movie. Just because you have already rental 20 videos in a month for instance.

Now lets discuss some more on video rental and retail subjects. Lets continue with some tips on where to actually rent videos. At the moment on of the biggest video rental companies in USA is Netflix.Netflix has a normal retail store, along with its online possibilities. It was established in 1998 and has a collection of 85,000 titles, and have passed 6.7 million subscribers. Its safe to say that they dominate in the marketplace. Prizes are from $4.99 to $23.99 monthly. As they have 100 shipping points in the US, that means that they are able to ship the dvd to you within one business day. This is a great offer. If it isn't fast enough to get the dvd at your doorstep, they also offer 5 hours of videos instantly on your computer.

An other company that are huge in the video rental and retail business is Blockbuster Inc. In fact it is one of the largest chains of video rental business in the world. They have a very similar offer as netflix. You give them a list of your movie choices and they will ship them to your door. It cant get any simpler really. They claim to have no hidden or late fees on their video rental service (Same as Netflix).

The prizes go from 8.99 to 17.99. What probably most people dont know about Blockbuster memberships, is that online subscribers gets discounts on online retail purchases. If your serious about video rental and retail in general, as you should be since you have come to this blog. Then the advice is to join one of these to companies, as their offers have become really good for just about anyone wanting to rent videos cheap and easy. If I had to decide I would go with Netflix, they have a feature rich website, incredible selection of videos, a video and movie recommendation service, and member ratings. You just cant go wrong with Netflix, also I have heard and read much positive reviews of their services. Its time to get serious on video rental online! The offline old video retail stores are not needed anymore.

The Pros and Cons of online video renting

Here is the list of what I think about the online video rental services, when it comes to renting new blockbusters movies, or just movies in general.

The Pro`s are:
- It fast and easy.
- Low price
- No waiting in line.
- You save money on transportation to the video store.
- You save time and energy
- Better selection of movies to choose from.
- Easier to find what you are looking for.
- Easier to get additional information about the movies, when you already are on the Internet.
- Like stated above, you can watch trailers and read reviews before renting the video.

The Cons of video rental online:
- If you have trouble picking out videos yourself, or if you need advice from someone in real life, then you have little or costumer support.
- You don't get the video right away, but usually have to wait it to get shipped to your home.
- Are there more cons? Let me know with a comment, if you have any.

Ok, this list was probably taken a bit too far at some points, but you get the idea, of how convenient and nice it is with online video rental.

General information of the market

It is with no doubt that the old way of renting videos has drastically gone slowly away. This is no good news for those who have jobs in the video rental business. Its not known how many who has now lost their jobs worldwide, but this has to be a very large number of people.
Sure there are still retail stores left, who serves you with new blockbusters movies for rent. But they are few in numbers, and often have few costumers. A thing to note is that its not just the independent video stores, that feels the pressure and competition from the online video business. Even the large companies are making cutbacks. I think its amazing how the world change in such a short period of time. I really don't think it is that long ago, I was renting vhs videos from the local video store like everyone else. Now no one does this anymore, and renting dvd`s in a retail store is also a rare thing.